


Shut Up and Dance

by yumekuimono



Series: Nested 'Verse [1]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Arc Reactor For Life, Cuddles, Dancing Steve Rogers, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M, Marriage, Multi, Pre-Serum, eventual OT3, mostly Iron Man 3 compliant, some liberties
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-29
Updated: 2016-03-02
Packaged: 2018-05-23 20:45:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,613
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6129547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yumekuimono/pseuds/yumekuimono
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve doesn't dance. Well, except in cases of semi-coercion. Surprisingly, good things tend to come out of it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. 1940

**Author's Note:**

> So my choir started singing "Shut Up and Dance" and my first thought was of Bucky and/or Tony telling this to Steve and it was too adorable not to write. I wouldn't consider this a song-fic, though, since I really only stole the title.
> 
> Enjoy!

The station changes, replacing the newsreader’s voice with swelling brass and a syncopated rhythm section. Steve looks up from the tawdry paperback he’d been reading to see Bucky step back from the radio perched precariously on the windowsill. He saunters over to where Steve is sitting on their battered old couch (one of the few things they had kept from his mother’s place, though it had already been second- or third-hand by the time it had made it there), holding out a hand and a smile.

“What?”

“Come on. Just ’cause we ain’t got the money to go dancing  right now don’t mean we can’t.” They had managed to sell some of the stuff they didn’t need, after Sarah passed, but most of the people in this part of town were no better off than they were and a lot of their old things had gone for free. What little extra money they had made was used up by now. Bucky’s job at the garage and whatever pieces of ad copy Steve managed to sell gave them just enough to keep going hand-to-mouth.

“And this must be the fifth time you’ve read that, so don’t give me any excuses about having to finish.”

“Buck, you know I can’t dance.”

“Steve.”

“I got two left feet,” he protests.

“Stevie,” Bucky says with a smile. “Just shut up and dance with me.”

And, well, he never could refuse his best friend, so Steve dog-ears his book and takes Bucky’s hand. There’s not much room in their cramped apartment, even after Bucky shoves the table out of the way, so they end up tracing tight circles over the floor. They take it slow, half the actual tempo, for which Steve is thankful. He doesn’t think he could have kept up otherwise—definitely would have done something embarrassing. It’s a miracle he hasn’t yet.

Suddenly he feels awkward, and it’s not just because of his clumsiness. He stares at Bucky’s chest, then quickly over his shoulder, conscious of his presence where a dame would be. Should be. He can feel a blush creeping high over his cheekbones, and he silently curses his pale Irish skin. He chances a glance at Bucky’s face and finds a small smile there. Before he can figure out what it means though, it’s gone, something bright and mischievous sliding into its place. Steve’s eyes widen as he realizes the song is coming to an end.

“Bucky, don’t you dare. Don’t even think—no, no, no no no—”

Bucky dips him.

“You jerk!”

Bucky just laughs and pulls him upright. Steve trips on his own feet and stumbles into Bucky, and then strong arms are wrapping around him, holding him close against Bucky’s solid presence.

“I got you,” he murmurs.

Steve looks up and slate blue eyes meet his own, that expression from before now stronger. It’s nothing new, he realizes with a jolt, he’s just never allowed himself to see it for what it is before. Had not quite dared to hope. But now there’s no avoiding it, and something about that makes him brave. He reaches one hand up, brushing his fingers over Bucky’s cheek, then into his hair, pulling him down as he leans up on his toes. Their lips meet, and for a moment it’s as slow and sweet as their dancing.

Bucky pulls away though, hands sliding to Steve’s hips, putting space in between their bodies. There’s concern in his eyes, but Steve just wants his warmth back.

“Stevie, are you sure about this?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

Bucky glances away for a moment. “You deserve better. A respectable, sweet woman that you can get married to and live in a nice little house with and have a gaggle of children together, and have a happy, _normal_ life.”

“You deserve all that too.”

“I don’t want any of it.”

“Well, maybe I don’t either.”

“We’d have to hide. If we’re caught, we’ll be treated like criminals.” _I couldn’t do that to you_ , Bucky doesn’t say, but Steve hears all the same.

“Then we won’t get caught. Bucky, I love _you_ , and I’m with you ’til the end of the line.”

Bucky makes a noise low in his throat and picks him up, setting him on the table so they’re of equal height. The kiss this time takes Steve’s breath away but he doesn’t care. It’s a good sort of desperation. He wraps his legs around Bucky, pulling him as close as possible, eliciting more throaty moans (sounds which Steve is quickly coming to appreciate). Bucky runs his teeth over Steve’s bottom lip, making him gasp, and Bucky takes the opportunity to slip his tongue inside his mouth. Interminable moments later they pull back, breathing hard, and Bucky leans their foreheads together.

“I love you too, ya punk.”

Steve huffs a laugh and presses a kiss to the corner of Bucky’s mouth.


	2. 1943

They could have given any number of reasons why they never went much farther than that—thin walls, creaky bedsprings, Steve’s health, plausible deniability—but none of those reasons matter when Captain America defies orders and rescues one Sargent Barnes from a HYDRA base in Kreischberg. That night they’re just Steve and Bucky again, together against all odds and staring each other’s mortality in the face, and neither of them want to wait any longer.

Their next months together and passionate and intense and terrifying, a rollercoaster of emotions caught up in a whirlwind of activity as the Howling Commandos take down base after HYDRA base. And then there’s a supply train running through the Alps, and it all comes to a sudden, crashing, plunging halt. It’s probably a good thing Steve can’t get drunk and bring himself even lower. He finds his oblivion another way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gah, sorry for all the angst here, but it had to happen to make way for all the fluff later.


	3. 2012

When Steve wakes up the pain is still there, even though it’s been nearly seventy years. For a while the strangeness and confusion of the future drowns it out. And then, just when he thinks he’s got a handle on things and can begin to address the gaping hole in his heart, he’s confronted with the smart-ass, rule-breaking, blisteringly intelligent, bafflingly attractive son of Howard Stark. It’s too much too soon, and it feels like a betrayal. So he lashes out, tongue loosened by the power of Loki’s scepter and the feeling of his control slipping through his grasp. It’s not his proudest moment, to say the least. But somehow, at the end of it all, he finds that Tony has managed to slip past everyone else and into a spot in his chest, right next to Bucky. He doesn’t fill the hole in, but rather coexists with it and Steve thinks that if he let him, Tony could be what Bucky had been once, and even though he’ll never stop loving Bucky, that could be okay.


	4. 2013

Steve is sitting on the couch in the Avengers’ communal area, sketchpad on his knees, when music suddenly starts up from the overhead speakers. Before he can ask JARVIS what’s going on, Tony waltzes in from the kitchen holding a cup of coffee and singing along. Something about being the champion of the world.

“Heya, Cap, what’s up?”

“Trying to recall lessons from art school.”

“Oh. Boring. _I_ have just finished my project for SI, including all the stupid changes the board wanted _and_ the relevant mountains of paperwork, _and_ completed the upgrades on Widow’s Bite, Clint’s arrows, and my suit, all in…thirty-six hours, which means I’m still in the delirious phase of sleep deprivation, which _means_ I need to celebrate.”

Tony sets his mug down and begins to dance around the room as Steve tries unsuccessfully to fight down a smile. Suddenly Tony stops, declaring, “JARVIS! This is not good dancing music, put on good dancing music. Not—” He holds up one finger. “—funk.” JARVIS obligingly changes the song to a wailing rock ballad which nonetheless has a better rhythm, and Tony resumes his circuit of the floor.

Steve flips to a new page and starts a drawing of Tony, trying to capture the constant motion in the inventor’s frame. He doesn’t notice Tony has stopped in front of him until he hears an expectant cough. Steve glances up in surprise.

“What?”

“It’s awkward if I’m the only one dancing.”

“Tony, I don’t dance.”

“You can’t seriously tell me you never dance.”

“Well, not never, but…rarely?”

“So then you do dance.”

“I suppose.”

“Well then, shut up and dance.”

Whatever Steve is about to say dies in his throat, and he tosses his sketchbook down next to Tony’s coffee with a rueful smile and a shake of his head.

“I gotta warn you though, I don’t go for any of those newfangled moves.”

“Didn’t think you would,” Tony says with a smile, offering a hand.

Steve takes the lead this time, and he can’t deny he’s been craving this closeness.

After the incident with AIM, when Tony had displayed the full power of the Iron Legion and subsequently injected himself with a stabilized version of Extremis (which was unfortunately no longer potent enough to allow the removal of the arc reactor, but did bestow an advanced healing factor and more than compensated for the reactor in terms of physical ability), Pepper had told him in no uncertain terms that while she loved him very much and would always be his friend, she couldn’t be his partner anymore. The world was suddenly full of superheroes, but also equally full of people determined to destroy them, and Tony was right there in the middle of it, and Pepper could no longer bear to be left watching and worrying.

Tony had protested, but in the end he couldn’t argue with her, and instead had spent several weeks moping around the Tower until Bruce had gently suggested that he actually ask the rest of the Avengers to take up residence in the floors he had set aside for them. They’d all said yes, of course, but since Thor had duties on Asgard and Clint and Natasha were still active field agents, Steve was the only one who had moved into the Tower on a permanent basis. He’d tried to tell himself he was doing it because he wanted a sense of belonging, or more independence from SHIELD, or to be closer to his friends, or at least that if it _was_ because of Pepper’s absence it was for Tony’s sake and not his own. Right now, though, he’s wondering why he needs any of those reasons at all.

When the song ends on a long drawn-out guitar note made fuzzy and electronic with distortion, Steve spins Tony onto the couch, and he goes laughing. Steve sits next to him and says casually, “You know, that’s not the first time someone’s told me that.”

“Told you what?”

“To shut up and dance.”

“Oh, really?” Tony grins. “How’d that work out?”

“Much the same, though there is something missing this time around.”

They’ve shifted closer together, and the light hitting Tony’s eyes turns them caramel colored when he responds with feigned nonchalance, “Hmm? And what’s that?”

Steve leans over and kisses him. He intends for it to be short, but Tony catches his mouth as he’s pulling away and yeah, he can definitely keep up with this. Tony shifts into his lap, arms over his shoulders and fingers at the nape of his neck playing a counterpoint to the slide of lips and teeth and tongues. Steve runs his hands up Tony’s ribs, pulling his shirt up a little and drawing out a matching moan. He takes in a sharp breath when Tony presses his hips closer, breaking contact slightly, and their eyes meet, dark and wide.

They move it upstairs because Clint’s supposed to be back from a mission today and they do not need him walking in and ruining the mood. Afterwards, they lay in a semi-organized tangle of limbs and Steve discovers a newfound appreciation for beds as locations for recreational activity.

Tony shifts so he can look at him, letting out a contented sigh. “So, not that I’m complaining or anything, ’cause that was amazing, but I have to say I was not expecting that.”

“I was in the army, Tony,” Steve reminds him. “We were at war. We never knew if we’d see each other again.”

Tony is quiet for a moment before asking, “It was Barnes, wasn’t it?”

Even through the haze of contentment Steve can feel the pain twist in his chest, and he’s not sure what he’s supposed to say to that. What there is he can say.

“Hey, it’s okay. My old man never shut up about you, and even though he didn’t give a damn about any of the other Commandos, Barnes was always there, sort of sneaking in around the edges of his stories. And then with your comment earlier…well, it wasn’t hard to figure out. It’s been so long for the rest of us it’s easy to forget you’re on the rebound too.”

Steve frowns a little. “I don’t want this to be just a rebound.”

“Good. Me neither.” Tony’s smile is broad and languid and unusually sincere. Then his eyelids droop and he barely suppresses yawn.

Steve smiles back at him. “Go to sleep, Tony.”


	5. 2016

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am pretending Civil War is not a thing that happens. Ever. At all. In any way. Because I am not prepared to deal with that sad. So I'm writing ridiculous amounts of fluff instead.
> 
> Enjoy!

The three of them are sitting on the couch, a mindless action movie playing quietly on the screen in front of them. Or to be more precise, Steve and Bucky are sitting and Tony is sprawled across their laps, Bucky’s fingers carding absently through his hair and one of Steve’s hand curled loosely around an ankle. Bucky has his head leaning against Steve’s shoulder, and Steve is really not paying much attention to the movie. He’s too busy being baffled and happy and stupidly grateful that somehow Bucky had managed to come back to him, and somehow Tony had been okay with it, and somehow the two of them had _also_ fallen in love and the three of them had made it work together. It’s been almost two years, but he still finds it overwhelming sometimes, and truth be told, he doesn’t really want it to stop being that way.

Onscreen, the hero is finally reunited with his family, and the camera pans out as he kisses his wife. As the screen switches to black and the credits start crawling upwards, Tony turns to look up at them.

“I think you two should get married.”

Bucky lifts his head to look at him properly. “What? …why?”

A smile plays around Tony’s mouth as he responds simply, “Because it wasn’t something you could even dream about, y’know, before, but now you can.”

“What about you?” Steve asks. “Same-sex unions might be legal, but polyamorous ones definitely aren’t.”

Tony shrugs one shoulder. “I never really believed in marriage. But I kinda really wanna be there for yours. Besides, who else would you ask to be your best man?”

Steve and Bucky look at each other, and their expressions are mirror images of the same unspoken questions. This was something neither of them had allowed themselves to want, since their relationship had become clear and many of the usual doors had shut in their faces. Still, marriage had been the expectation—the ideal—and there always was something appealing about it, even if they never explicitly indulged in the what if. It’s Bucky who breaks the momentary silence.

“Well, then. Steven Grant Rogers, will you marry me?”

And this is not at all the way Steve would ever have expected to be asked that question, if he’d ever expected to be the one _being_ asked at all, but then again, nothing in Steve’s life has gone the way he thought it would since he was about twenty, and there’s really only one answer for him to give.

“Yes.”

He leans over and kisses Bucky, rubbing circles over Tony’s ankle with one thumb.

They plan for early summer, before the heat gets too stifling, and Pepper graciously takes time out of her busy schedule to help orchestrate preparations in a fearful whirl of organization because none of them really know what they’re doing. It’s not going to be big (and actually has to be kept relatively secret if they don’t want a media tail), but there are still far too many decisions to make. They do get made though, and as the date approaches Steve can feel a mounting sense of excitement in his chest, like standing before a battlefield but so, so much better.

The mansion is commandeered for the occasion, and Steve finds himself in a lavishly furnished room, adjusting his bowtie for what feels like at least the eleventh time.

“Hey.” Tony slips into the room, already impeccably dressed in a matching tuxedo (everyone knows the three of them are together, and Steve and Bucky had insisted). He looks good, Steve thinks, has always looked good in a suit.

“Hey,” he says back as Tony reaches up and tugs his bowtie straight. “Do you know where Bucky is?” The former assassin (and oh Lord, his _fiancé_ ) had managed to disappear before Steve was awake, despite what Bucky called his annoyingly-early habits.

“If I did I wouldn’t tell you,” Tony says with a grin that’s as good as a yes. “It’s bad luck to see each other before the wedding.”

“Well…” Steve draws out the word because of course he knows that. “If I can’t see him, will you give him a message from me?”

“Depends on what it is.”

He slides a hand around the back of Tony’s head and pulls him into a passionate kiss, making Tony hum with pleasure.

“I love you,” Steve murmurs as they pull apart.

“Oh, I am definitely telling James that,” Tony breathes.

“Tony?”

“Hmm?”

“I love you too.”

“Yeah.” Tony flashes a smile and leans up to kiss him again before slipping back out of the room to find their other lover. Steve waits until he’s gone before he lets his fingers brush over the item tucked safely in his pocket.

Before he knows it, they’re standing together at the altar, and Steve is barely processing what’s being said because they’re holding each other’s hands and staring into each other’s eyes and trying (and failing) to at least look like they’re paying _some_ attention to the poor minister and not just completely dissolving into smiles like the lovesick fools they not-so-secretly are. And then Bucky is taking a simple gold band from Tony and slipping it onto his finger, and Steve is doing the same for him, and then they’re kissing, to the applause of their gathered friends and adopted family.

Later, after they’ve received congratulations and gifts from just about everybody and realized that, wow, they do know quite a few people in the twenty-first century, and the party moved indoors, and the cake been cut and eaten, they’re talking to Sam Wilson, one of the few non-SHIELD people Steve had gotten to know in D.C., when Tony sidles up and nudges Bucky. Sam, ever the soul of social aptitude, doesn’t miss the look that passes between the two of them and politely makes his exit.

“Hey Stevie,” Bucky (his _husband_ now—and doesn’t that just give him all sorts of warm fluttery feelings) says. “Do you remember the first time we kissed?”

“’Course I do. Why?”

Bucky doesn’t reply, just grins at him, and then there’s a smile pulling at the corners of Steve’s mouth too as he hears familiar notes come drifting over the room’s speakers.

“How did you—?” Then he notices the smile on Tony’s face and asks, “Did you have something to do with this?”

“Maybe,” Tony responds coyly.

“But Stevie,” Bucky breaks in, “you’re missing the point.”

“Which is?”

“Shut up and dance.”

Steve laughs and Bucky pulls him into the middle of the floor, launching them into motion. After a few moments they’re joined by other couples—Natasha and Bruce, Thor and Jane, Tony’s intern Peter and his boyfriend Wade, Clint and the now-officially-reintroduced Coulson—and then the room is filled with people dancing. Tony appears at their side as they share a kiss as the song comes to a close, announcing that he can’t decide which of them to ask for the next dance, and this time it’s Steve’s turn to share a glance with Bucky.

“Tony,” Steve says, “we have something for you too.” He reaches into his pocket and pulls out the small case that’s been sitting there since the morning. “I know you said you didn’t believe in marriage, but…” He flips it open to reveal a gold ring to match the ones he and Bucky are already wearing, and Tony’s eyes widen in shock. “Will you wear it?”

For a beat Tony is speechless, then, “ _Yes._ Yes, of course I will. Yes.” He reaches up and kisses Bucky as Steve takes his hand and slips the ring onto his finger, then he turns and kisses Steve too.

Tony stares at the gold band for a bit and finally manages, “I can’t— I don’t even know what to say to this.”

Bucky grins and takes his hand from Steve. “Then don’t say anything. Like I told Stevie, shut up and dance.”

Steve leans against a table and watches the two men he’s pledged his life to as they sway to the music. Tony has the biggest smile on his face, as does Bucky, and as Tony flashes a ridiculously happy glance back at him over Bucky’s shoulder, Steve knows he’s got one to match, and right now, he’s not sure it’s even possible for his life to get any better.


End file.
